Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / During the “Golden Age of Freethought” in the United States from the 1870s to the 1910s, Robert Ingersoll (1833-1899) acted as one of its most popular and influential figures within the movement, whose supporters advocated for skepticism, science, and the separation of church and state. However, his role as a “public intellectual” has been challenged by scholars of the period, who argue that he was merely a popularizer of ideas. This conclusion does not adequately describe Ingersoll’s role within the period. Rather, Ingersoll was a synthesizer of ideas, making complex concepts of philosophy, theology, science, and history into palatable lectures and books for an eager and understanding public. As a complementary counterpoint to his role as synthesizer, he also spurred a multiplicity of responses from believers and nonbelievers alike who imbibed his ideas. As such, his role in the central Midwest, Illinois and Indiana in particular, supports his place as a public intellectual. From his public discourses with the evangelist Dwight Moody and other believers, his influence on the Freethinker Society of Indianapolis, to his answers to Indianapolis clergy, Ingersoll’s experiences in the Midwest solidified his place within American history as a compelling and thoughtful public intellectual.

<p>While the field of religious studies increasingly turns toward material culture as a counterbalance to understandings of religion that privilege questions of individual belief, theology, and text, influential histories of atheism in the West remain largely confined to the mode of intellectual history. This is understandable when atheism is commonly understood first-and-foremost as an idea about the nonexistence of God. But like religion, atheism is not a purely intellectual position; it is rooted in interpersonal emotional exchanges, material objects and media, and historically-contextual social communities. This dissertation uses tools from the materialist turns in both religious studies and media studies to explore the history of American atheism and its reliance on non-intellectual and non-rational forces. Drawing on theories of affect, visual culture, and aesthetics, it argues that atheism in America has always been more than an idea. In particular, it uses different media forms as lenses to examine the material bases of evolving forms of American disbelief from the 19th century to today. Using archival records of nineteenth-century print media and political cartoons, transcripts and audio-recordings of radio broadcasts during the mid-twentieth-century, and digital ethnography and discourse analysis on contemporary Internet platforms, this dissertation argues that American irreligion has often eschewed the rational in favor of emotional and material strategies for defining a collective identity. Each chapter highlights different metaphors that have been enabled by print, broadcast, and digital media – metaphors that American unbelievers have used to complicate the understanding of atheism as simply a set of beliefs about the nature of reality.</p> / Dissertation

The men and women who appear in this thesis are partof the first generation in the history of Europe to debatewidely and to reject religious belief. In Victoria theywere isolated from the main scenes of the struggle, theirnumbers were relatively insignificant, they made no originalor very influential contributions to the arguments,yet for them, a part of Europe on this tiny colonial stage,the drama was no less demanding on their consciences. Butbecause the stage was smaller, the central issues of thedebate emerge more clearly and simply than they do inEngland and America. By studying a microcosm of the controversyover "Religion and Science" in Victoria, we cangain some idea of the causes, and the magnitude of thegreat disturbance of belief that swept through the Christianworld in the later part of the Nineteenth Century.

This diploma thesis deals with so called "transfer movement" in Mělník in 1921. The term "transfer movement" refers to a strong campaign which tried to persuade people to leave the Roman Catholic Church before the census of February 1921 in or der to the emancipation of our nation from the Church would have been expressed. The general principle of the movement was that the Rome had always been our enemy, that the reformation is the very essence of our national identity and that the Catholic Church had been an ally of the Habsburg dynasty. The thesis tries to explore the role of the leading groups of the "transfer movement" (especially Czechoslovak Church, Evangelical Church of Czech Brethren and Freethought) and of the press in Mělník as well as the reaction of the local catholic clergy. The core of the work is based mainly on primary sources (both archive and published). It was found that the transfer movement was rather successful. No violent clashes were reported. The local press played an important role and supported the transfer movement. Keywords: transfer movement, Mělník, Czechoslovak Church, Evangelical Church of Czech Brethren, Freethought, discourse analysis